TxDOT Sunset bill hijacked by Perry, special interests

Governor Rick Perry managed to dismantle every pro-taxpayer reform in the Texas Department of Transportation Sunset bill as evidenced in the watered down version that the Texas House Transportation Committee voted out of committee yesterday. The Senate did the same late last week.

After hundreds of public comments demanding a total house cleaning at this rogue agency responsible for a $1.1 billion accounting error, pushing the Trans Texas Corridor, and unwanted privatized toll roads that will charge Texans 75 cents per mile in tolls (equivalent to adding $15 to every gallon of gas you buy), both the House and Senate Committees nullified all meaningful reforms and hence the whole purpose of sunset reviews.

Legislators on these committees caved to the Governor’s wishes to protect his prized agency that’s promoting his controversial and disliked transportation policies unchecked by removing the recommendations adopted by the Sunset Advisory Commission to abolish the Transportation Commission comprised of 5 appointees of the governor and replace it with a single Commissioner. These Committees erased that and other reforms returning the governance of TxDOT to status quo, unchanged. This after two scathing sunset committee reports and too may negative audits to count.

The House had also inserted an independent Inspector General, but then neutered it by having the Inspector General report to the Transportation Commission (it’s pointless to have the Inspector report to the same agency its hired to watchdog). They’ve weakened the restrictions on taxpayer-funded lobbying by TxDOT as well.

The Sunset bill ceased to be about reform when the Sunset Advisory Commission allowed special interests to include the re-authorization of design-build contracts in the bill, which cost taxpayers more and don’t necessarily save time. These contracts are very controversial and since there’s no fixed design done at the time of the bidding (no hard bid, very preliminary design and all the bidders may submit different designs so you’re not comparing apples to apples), you don’t even discuss price until after the developer is chosen and THEN the developer finishes the design (and the private entities own the design). So the contracts are initially awarded based on intangibles, not price which tends to open up the process to favoritism and squeeze out the little guy.

Let’s not forget what the Grant Thornton Management Audit uncovered about this agency:

• Nearly every department within the agency received a rating of orange or red, meaning results donʼt fully or consistently meet requirements or issues or incidents consistently or frequently impede performance.
–- YET performance reviews show over 88% of employees performing above average and TxDOT executive pay exceeds other public sector counterparts by 30-50%!

• TxDOT is unable to track and communicate how the annual budget is expended.

• Conversations with TxDOTʼs senior leaders reveal a deep-seated belief that TxDOT is doing all the right things and that criticisms leveled against the organization will decline when TxDOT is better able to demonstrate to people how right the organization is.

• We heard in interviews that the TxDOT community was too small a family to ever provide a negative rating to someone on their performance review.

• Size of staff – TxDOT does not base its employee requests on actual needs…the staff allocation may be either greater than or less than the true employee requirement.

• The current employee performance program does little to motivate high performance, little to discourage low performance and generally is NOT helping TxDOT achieve organization goals.

• Historically, the TxDOT culture…has NOT promoted a requirement to stay within
budget or to be cost conscious and judicious in the use of funds.

• Top leadership is perceived as not being open to feedback, open dialogue or challenges – people expressed fear of saying “no”; perceived as out of touch with staff concerns and morale; and perceived as lacking respect for governing bodies (e.g., Transportation Commission, Legislature).

• Without a process to verify financial data, conflicting data is sometimes released, and as a result, financial data is mistrusted by most external stakeholders. Implementing financial controls to improve accuracy and reliability will ensure TxDOTʼs constituents and stakeholders receive consistent, reliable and trust-worthy data.

• There are many examples of projects with overruns exceeding $10 million and even doubling the original estimates.

• Needs to improve the quality of designs which can reduce costs associated with change orders during construction and reduce project delays associated with poor quality designs.

• Messaging is responsive rather than proactive…Project status information is not accurate…Project information displayed in multiple tools present different information, and there is not an authoritative source for this information.

• TxDOT does not have a reliable way to confirm that projects are well-defined and scoped, that the chosen technical approach or solution is feasible, that the estimated cost is realistic or what the expected return on the investment will be. This approach to implementing technology increases TxDOT risk – of project failure, of incurring increased cost due to vague scope definition or scope creep, of technology incompatibility, of incurring redevelopment costs or higher-than-necessary maintenance costs.

• Districts are able to develop and ultimately projects are let because they are ready for construction, even when they are NOT the highest priority projects for the state.

Results of one-party control?

The waste, failures, and ineptitude are lengthy and too sordid to include them all here. So to allow this agency to march off into the sunset with NOT ONE meaningful reform is criminal and would open up the taxpayers to further and even cavalier waste, fraud, and abuse, since TxDOT will proceed onward without any accountability nor any structural, fundamental change to the way the agency operates.

Truly, the TxDOT Sunset bill in its present form is a deplorable referendum on one party control of Texas governance. No one seems to have the spine to stand up to the Governor regarding his pet state agency to insist on accountability, a total house cleaning, and fundamental reforms that will restore the public trust and get transportation policy back on the right footing.

Lawmakers have a fiduciary duty to ensure taxpayers money is being spent properly, efficiently, and responsibly. If we don’t insist that they do, it’ll be Katie-bar-the-door to licentious waste, fraud, and abuse at TxDOT for years to come at a time when resources are already scarce.

Demand accountability

Contact your legislator here and insist they scrap TxDOT and start over from the ground-up with ELECTED leadership, an independent Inspector General, and zero-based budgeting.